Sunday, February 17, 2008

A second Danish cartoonist has been forced to live under police protection by the renewal of the Mohammed Cartoon Crisis. Our Danish correspondent Kepiblanc has translated an article about Franz Füchsel from Fyens Stiftstidende.

First, a note from the translator:

Franz Füchsel is one of the best known illustrators over here. He is funny and extremely productive in newspapers, magazines and books.

“Hang on, go back; after all it’s only a drawing made up by a South Jutland infidel.”

And now the article:

Cartoonist forced to live under police protection.

“I am not afraid, but worried,” says Franz Füchsel, a cartoonist who made one of the twelve Mohammed cartoons

The well-known cartoonist Franz Füchsel, living on the Danish island Fyn [Funen] has had his security detail re-established since last week, when PET foiled the murder plot against his colleague Kurt Westergaard. Franz Füchsel says to Fyens Stiftstidende that he is grateful for the police surveillance of his home.

“Once again some lunatics are on stage. They always will be. We cannot prevent it,” he says in his first major interview since the Mohammed crisis two years ago.

Last week Franz Füchsel took refuge in his summer cabin somewhere on the west coast in order to keep a low profile.

Does not regret his drawing

In spite of his children’s protest, he agreed to express his take on the whole affair.

6
comments:

Trite and obvious, yes, but this must be said, over and over, until it is heard:

It is not a way of proving the sanctity of your values and symbols when you riot, burn, kill, and, yes, incite hatred against those who mock you for rioting, burning, killing, and inciting hatred.

It’s the ones who do that who are in fact the radicals, fanatics and extremists who are using their beliefs as justification to hurt others.

I am a skeptic; I regard all religions as the groping attempts of pre-scientific societies to make sense of their world and their place in it.

Instead, I hold sacred the ideals behind the U.S. Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, particularly the Bill of Rights. I most highly esteem the First and Second Amendments, which acknowledge (but do not grant) my right to express to my conscience, whoever it may offend, including my exercise of the power of life and death to defend myself and resist tyranny.

I love when people who have no appreciation for the utter uniqueness of Islam and the values of Islam speak so ignorantly on this subject.

"I am a skeptic; I regard all religions as the groping attempts of pre-scientific societies to make sense of their world and their place in it."

Well that's nice.. if you were so scientific you would be able to see the objective facts about Islam that makes it singularly threatening and you wouldnt' lump all religions together (which results in diluting the dangers of Islam).

And if you were sceintific you wouldn't have made this statement, because it's not true.

"It is not a way of proving the sanctity of your values and symbols when you riot, burn, kill, and, yes, incite hatred against those who mock you for rioting, burning, killing, and inciting hatred."

“Once again some lunatics are on stage. They always will be. We cannot prevent it,”[Emphasis Added]

Ummmm ... no. It's not just "some lunatics", it's MUSLIMS. Not "Islamists", not "fundamentalists", not "Islamofascists", not "extremists", not "radicals" but MUSLIMS. The vast majority of Muslims obviously support this flagrant assault on free speech, otherwise they'd be up in arms over how this supposedly small minority of their radical co-religionists routinely make such a total laughingstock out of Islam.

They are not and therefore it is safe to assume that those who threaten the cartoonists represent mainstream Muslim opinion. There is a collective responsibility for all Muslims to make it clear as to exactly what Islam stands for. To date, be it through vociferous protest or—as is more often the case—deafening silence, they have indeed taken a collective stand. Little does Islam realize that, to quote a Spanish journalist:

After a while, silence is no longer consent, to remain silent is to lie.

It's long past tea for Western nations to begin imposing collective punishment over Islam's refusal to police its followers. Muslims quite evidently have very little trouble meting out capital punishment to apostates and blashphemers. How is it that those who make Islam appear so ridiculous in the world's eyes are not subject to any penalty?

There is no other alternative but to believe that Muslims who condemn freedom of religion and free speech are voicing the exact thoughts of Islam itself. Nowhere is there any noticeable Muslim outrage or objection over the strident opposition being shown by their brethern towards free expression or religious pluralism.

Our world's very survival now depends upon responsible parties coming forward and doing their level best to eliminate even the least misunderstanding over how all of us will attain some degree of peaceful coexistence.

Islam is doing nothing of the sort. In fact, it is doing everything within its power to plunge this globe into a conflict that will make both World Wars combined look puny in comparison. For this, Muslims must be made to pay. Once Islam actively demonstrates some genuine concern over the welfare of EVERY OTHER CULTURE ON EARTH, only then should they get even a micron of slack. Until then open season must be declared on those who seek global domination by force.

“I’m not afraid, but worried,” says the cartoonist, who doesn’t regret his drawing — which later was sold and thus financed the rebuilding of a Turkish village destroyed by an earthquake.

If you heard some sort of explosion in the background, that was my Frink-O-Matic™ Irony Meter detonating.

I agree that lumping all religions together is a big mistake, both moral and tactical. It both flatters Islam and insults all the rest. That may be no matter for an atheist who has contempt for all religions but since he expresses faith in science, where is the "scientific" method of observation and facts?

Islam is unlike the other world religions in significant ways. It is really an ideology with the trappings of religion. Anywhere Islam dominates:

It does not recognize separation of church and state. The law of Islamic lands is sharia. Islamists in the single exception of Turkey are trying to undo Ataturk's secularization of the state.

Sharia's barbarisms derive from its origin 14 centuries ago and have undergone no significant reform.

Islam alone has no form of the Golden Rule. It has an intolerant supremacist agenda and will not co-exist with other religions wherever it becomes the majority. It cleanses non-Muslims from the body politic and eventually the country even if that country started out as majority non-Muslim.

Muslim countries are economically backward and devoid of human rights as internationally understood in the 21st century. Except for those who through no effort of their own have oil revenues, they offer their citizens subsistence living if that.

Contrast what the Israelis with the Western Democratic system have accomplished, to what Palestinian Arabs have done in the same time period, with their never-ending hate fest. This presents the starkest comparison between Islam, which thrives on destruction or robbing others and all other religions which are builders.

Islam is a totalitarianism potentially more dangerous than communism. Though both pictured world-wide dominance, in practice, communism was confined within certain national borders and did not succeed in planting enclaves in every North American and European city.

Atheists will not be allowed to be atheists in an Islamic state, so it behooves them to educate themselves on the threat coming their way. I'm not holding my breath though. Their unjustified smug sense of superiority gets in the way of even their own survival.

I said I'm a skeptic to show that my unqualified rejection of Islam does not arise because it conflicts with my adherence to any other faith. I recognize that several religions, Christianity first among them, have provided excellent social frameworks. It is only their magical foundations I reject--but that is beyond the scope of this forum.

I absolutely agree that Islam is far more dangerous than any other religion I know of. It's possible to warp any religion into a vessel of hatred and violence, even when its founders, prophets, and disciples teach tolerance and peace. Islam, however, was specifically designed as a warrior cult--and it meets that goal with singular efficiency. By that standard, it may well be the most successful religion ever devised.

(Communism may run second, but it's new enough that it's hard to guess at its longevity. Though very contagious, it's so toxic that any state trying to implement it falls into ruin, betraying its principles.)

Islam, in contrast, must be warped to achieve tolerance and peace. Unfortunately, warped Islam is weak, and will always be overwhelmed by the straight stuff.

Real Islam has maintained itself for over a thousand years. It's dangerous precisely because it's so successful on its own terms.

I am agonizingly aware of what I personally have at stake here--as an unbelieving skeptic, dhimmitude is not an option for me. I'm sure my conversion would be rejected if I offered it (rightly so, I might add; it would certainly be deceitful). I'm too old to be a useful slave. If defiance fails, only death remains.

And Vince, "proving" is not my word--I was trying to turn Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu's words back on him. What I was saying was, those who answer criticisms that they are violent with violence prove their critics' point.

I'm amazed that my words, which I'm sure would get me stoned under any brand of Islamism, are somehow being read as a softening, or even defense of it.